Some People Burn Brighter Than Stars
by Quasar-Hunter
Summary: Half-human Eversly Carson just wants to be accepted– purple skin and all. But after she loses her family, her best friend and her left leg when soldiers attack their village, she finds acceptance in the pirate crew who adopt her into their circle. Things become more complicated when rumors of war over a treasure map (and an attraction to John Silver) enter the mix. [Young JS X OC]
1. Burning Stars, Falling Sky

******Rating: **T for violence, language & romance (kissing… hugging… googly eyes… the horror!)

**Disclaimer:** I don't own Treasure Planet. I just think it's awesome and want to explore John Silver's past. Particularly in the *cough* romance department. E-hem… anyways… I don't own Treasure Planet or it's characters, but I do own my kick-butt OC. Feel free to write your own stories using her, just give credit to moi. Arigatou.

* * *

There's something beautiful about the vast expanse that is space.

Most of the time, people wax eloquently about things like the moons orbiting their planets, or the brilliancy of the stars–– even their sun.

I won't deny how incredible they are. But it's space that holds them.

The vastness that is space makes you feel small. Like a single quark of an atom within an entire being. It's beautiful and horrible and very, very humbling.

I see space every time I close my eyes. I want to be out there. I want to be cradled in its vast expanse.

Breathing the night air in and out in one colossal sigh, I open my eyes and look back up into the sky.

I'd like to say it's waiting for me, but space waits for no being.

I have to take it in my hands.

"Eversly? You up here?"

Tristan appears on the rooftop. His too-long blonde hair sways in the evening breeze.  
"Yeah, come on up."

He lies down next to me, his hands tucked behind his head as he stares up at the stars. "I thought your mom didn't want you to be out at night anymore after what happened last week."

"What she doesn't know shouldn't kill her. Besides, last week was an anomaly."

"Anomaly?"

"It was a strange occurrence. I'll be certain it doesn't happen again."

"You can't just think away things, Eversly. The world doesn't work like that."

I shrug. "Why can't it?"

"It just can't."

We lay in silence together. He's my best friend. We've lived next to each other since we were born. We've shared each other's dreams of space since grade school.

"The raids are getting worse, Eversly. You know they take no prisoners."

"Then me sitting on the roof isn't going to make any difference. If they come, they come."

He shrugs. "I guess so. It's a good thing it was a few towns over any ways."

We pause for a while, looking out at space and listening to each other's breathing.

"Why do you think they're attacking us?"

"Who knows? Do pirates need a reason to attack common villages?"

"It just seems strange," he says. "Odd that they'd be so riled. I wonder if the council recently passed anti-pirating laws."

I shrug. "I don't know. The council never tells us anything."

Tristan turns onto his side, his head still cradled in one hand. He looks me over with his pale mint-green eyes. He reaches out and tucks some hair behind my tapered ears.

"Sometimes I forget you're not completely human," he murmurs.

I smile, letting him catch a glimpse of my fangs. "You know I just want to fit in."

"I know." He smiles back and touches my forehead. "I wish you didn't want to."

"Want to what?"

"Fit in."

I shrug. "It's uncomfortable being the only non-human in a village of humans."

"I know. But you shouldn't have to hide who you are. Plus, you have purple skin. If it's not obvious that way…"

I turn away from him and look back up at the sky. He doesn't understand. He's my best friend and he doesn't understand.

I've known Tristan my entire life. We were born together–– our mothers had been best friends.

My father had saved Tristan's father's life, which makes us almost kin. When someone saves your life, you're bound to him or her. It's something that not even our people understand. By our people, I mean my non-human father's side. Those people.

Some people say it's a spiritual connection, like a linking of the souls. When one of us saves someone, or we are saved by someone else, our hearts are bound together until we satisfy our debt through service or saving their life in turn.

To repay his debt, Tristan's father brought my father here, to begin a new life in peace.

"What're you thinking about?"

"The past."

"Which part?"

"Our fathers."

He's quiet for a bit before he says, "It's weird to think that we're kin without being kin."

I shrug. "Not really."

"To you. Your mind just works differently."

"I guess so."

He glances out across the rooftops of the other houses. Smoke wafts from their chimneys and dim lights flicker in the windows. In the distance, the docks reach out over the cliff-face with their built-in lights glowing faintly.

"You want to go shooting tomorrow morning?" I ask.

"Why not?" he says with a smile. "I just love getting beaten."

"But it won't be a competition."

"With you, everything is a competition. Good night, Ever."

"Night, Tris."

He stands up and, swaying slightly, tiptoes across the roof back to his house. He turns back to look at me. "Six?"

"In the morning?"

"Yeah. Before school."

I shrug. "Why not. I'll bite."

He grins, then grips the edge of his house's roof and swings through his open window.

The cold bites at my bare toes as the wind picks up. I lay out, staring at the night sky until my eyes grow heavy and I drift off into the world of dreams.

I wake up as a scream pierces the darkness. Bolting upright, I look out over our town. The bright orange glow of flames quickly flares in one of the streets. Low, grumbled shouts and arguing voices break the original silence.

Lights come on in almost every house, including mine. Front doors open and men holding torches, their pistols jammed into their pockets, or brandished in one hand, many with their wives and children peeking out from behind them, look out into the street.

"Eversly?" I hear from just below me. "Eversly Carson! Get off that damn roof!"

I stand up and dash to the edge, then swing into my open window.

"I told you not to––"

"I'm sorry," I say quickly. "There's a fire. We have to hurry."

"You're not going anywhere. Let the men-folk take care of this."

"I can shoot a pistol better than any of them, except Papa. Please––"

"Hush. You're a young woman, Eversly. You need to leave the fighting to the males, who're better suited to it. You know I don't mind you practicing and learning to shoot, but war isn't kind to women. I don't––"

"You just don't want me to get hurt. I understand. But I'm––"

"End of discussion, Eversly," my mother says, her quiet voice breaking with fury.

I glance at the pistol my father gave me four years ago for my thirteenth birthday. Its handle sticks out from under my pillow.

She glances at it too, then says sharply, "If you use that, then I'll have to confiscate it."

"Mom! There might be pirates! Raiders! If it is, then you won't have to! We'll all be dead!"

She purses her lips. "Your father will take care of it."

I hang my head and look away. She takes me into her arms and kisses the top of my head. The purple glow of my skin contrasts against the pale white of hers.

"I love you, Ever. _For_ever."

"I know, Mom," I murmur.

"Now, don't leave this house. Understand?"

I nod. I don't plan on staying. There's no way I'm staying behind and letting them torch my village and murder our friends.

"Good."

She closes the door on the way out.

I glance to my open window, then hurry to my closet. I slip out of my pajamas and into some regular clothes. I jam my feet into my worn brown boots.

Grabbing my pistol on the way out, I throw myself out of my window and through Tristan's open one.

He's not in his room. His sock drawer, where he keeps his blaster, is still open and his bedroom door swings on its hinges.

I walk out of his room and stride down their upstairs hallway. Sliding down the stairs, I reach their kitchen. Tristan's mother holds a pistol as she wraps her arms around Tristan's younger siblings.

She glances up and her eyes widen. "Eversly? What's––"

I turn tail and dash out their front door. I hear shouting and the shots of blasters being fired. A woman screams somewhere nearby.

There's no time. They've come for us this time.

I take my blaster off its safety setting and creep across the street, and then dash down an alleyway.

Hauling myself up the side of a building, I pull myself onto the rooftop and look down.

The house below me creaks and fire roars. Adrenaline jolts my system as I realize was was stupid enough to jump onto the top of a burning house. As I run to try to get out of the smoke and onto a more safe home, I take aim at the nearest being I don't recognize.

Its green skin and tentacles pulse once before it explodes, spattering blue, gel-like blood across the street.

I see a few people look up, but I keep running. I hear the shot of a blaster and feel the burn of its plasma biting into the side of my arm. The feeling dies into a tingling numbness as I bring my hand to it.

I let go of it and lower myself down towards the roof edge. I don't know if I can support myself completely with both arms, but I definitely can't do it with just one.

Gritting my teeth from the pulling of injured muscles, I grab the gutter's edge and swing down as fast as I can to get it over with. I push through a window and tumble to the floor, rolling before I push myself up.

My arm sears with pain like I'm pressing hot coals to my skin. I glance down at it and have to look away. The nick is shallow, but ragged and slowly oozing purple blood. Already my shirt-sleeve is stained with a circle of violet.

I look around for some kind of rag to stop the blood-flow. Tearing open the drawer nearest to me, I pull out what I assume to be a man's undershirt. I can't confirm how sterile it is, but it'll have to do, especially since I'd rather use an undershirt than a dress shirt, which would be cleaner.

Quickly ripping a long swath from it before I fold another shred of it into a square pad, I press the square to my arm, then put the long piece between my arm and my chest.

Holding one end between my teeth, I struggle to wrap the other end around it and tie a tight knot.

The smell of smoke has crept up on me and I can almost hear the inferno in the house two down from this one. I hear more blaster fire, and the ruckus of battle continuing.

I dash through the house, my feet pounding against the worn, wood floors. Down the stairs. Across the living room. Out the front door.

Into a pirate.

Its soft, cream-colored flesh almost melts as someone fires a shot through it. It pools into a puddle on the ground and I jump over it.

I see my father, in a fist-fighting brawl with a tall and broad-shouldered humanoid. My father's normally purple skin is violent, midnight purple as he bares his fangs and bites into the man.

He keeps his jaws closed, so when the humanoid rips his arm away, his fangs rip across the flesh, leaving giant lesions.

Suddenly, I'm pushed from behind and tumble to the ground. Quickly turning to look up, a gigantic olive-gray alien takes a step backwards.

I roll out of the way before his giant foot crushes my legs.

Pushing myself to my feet, I take aim with my pistol and fire at the alien my father is fighting. It goes straight through what I presume to be its head.

It turns to look at me, and my father draws his knife and rips it through its torso, letting its innards flow and flop onto the pavement. It slowly falls to the ground.

My father runs towards me, his long, thin legs making it easy to reach me.

"Eversly. Go. Now! Go protect your mother!"

"But Papa, I––"

A blaster fires and it's like the world slows. My father's eyes grow wide and he looks down at me. He glances to his torso, his white shirt quickly staining with violet blood.

"Papa?"

He smiles faintly before his eyes roll into his head and he falls backwards, his head cracking against the pavement. A trickle of blood stains his now white face with purple.

I feel my blood boil. I see red. My skin is black. A tar black, burning so hot my clothes smoke.

With a scream of fury, I rush forward into battle, towards the pirate who just murdered my father.

Before I know it, blood stains my hands. The only way I can tell is because it drips from my fingers and stains my shirt.

Then, I realize I am alone. I breathe heavily, slumped in the entryway of a house. The street is dark. I smell smoke and burning plaster.

My pistol is missing. I look around wildly for it, then dash up.

They killed my father. Those sons of spaceport floozies killed my father.

I sprint down the street, past some of the bodies.

Stop.

I glance back at one of the bodies. Too-long blonde hair. Glassy blue-green eyes that stare up at the sky like he had just done a few hours ago.

Tristan lies face up in the street in a pool of his own blood. It coils around his stomach and head, staining his hair a disgusting burgundy-brown. His eyes reflect the stars he had always wanted to visit.

A scream lies at the front of my mouth, but refuses to leave as I fall to my knees at his head. My body curls over his as I sob into his frozen chest. His woolen scarf still smells like him, despite all the blood.

I take the gun he has gripped in his still-warm hands.

I'll kill them all.

My ears soon hear the screams of the others in our town. I hear blaster fire. I stand. Scarlet blood stains my pants and shirt.

Brandishing the gun, I sprint to the main road, towards the gunshots that still ring out in the night. The pale sun peeks onto our world, as though afraid to shed light on the destruction of our village.

I shoot the first pirate in sight. The shot sails through his head and green blood drips down from the entry wound. He quickly topples to the ground and his blood drips down the pavement.

I aim and fire again. There are no more screams. Just the crackle of flames. The next pirate falls. I can't control myself. I can't help but kill the men who took my father and my friend away from me.

I've killed three of them by the time they turn on me. Then, I run. I turn and run as fast as I can.

My lungs burn with the effort, but I keep running. I want to die with Tristan. Next to him. So that we can share the blood we never shared in real life.

Pirates–– especially raiders–– don't take prisoners.

I hear the blast before I feel the shattering pain in my leg. My knee crumples underneath my weight. I bite my lower lip to prevent them from hearing me scream.

No longer able to walk, I drag myself closer to his body. I can see it lying just a few feet in front of me.

One of them steps on my right arm, grinding it into the pavement. It shatters like a milk bottle under his boot, crunching and quickly going numb before it feels like a thousand knives rake the inside of my arm. I almost scream and instead grip my bottom lip with my teeth. I taste blood and I know I've split my lip. Tears roll down my cheeks as I try to pull myself just a bit farther.

They laugh as I drag my body along the ground with my one good arm. I finally reach Tristan, then grip onto his scarf–– the one his mother knitted for him so long ago. The wool has the scent of smoke and his family woven in with the thread.

Suddenly, everything goes black. My cheek presses into the blood-soaked pavement.

So this is what death feels like.

* * *

I can barely see through the haze that encompasses my vision. Everything is blurry, but I can smell blood, some kind of latex and something akin to antiseptic.

A hospital? My eyes open a bit further. I can see a few people through the haze. My eyes are so heavy. The room is dark, except for the huge lights that hang over my head. I try to sit up, but I'm so dizzy.

I can't move.

Voices break through the silence. They're muffled, but I can just make out their tones and a few of the words.

A mask goes over my face and I breathe in. Then out.

My eyelids grow heavy again. I don't want to go back to sleep. I want to enjoy death, if this is actually what death is.

I try to sit up again, but can't. I turn my head to the side. There's a bronze leg lying across a stand. Wires dangle from the end that would plug into a hip.

The afterlife makes no sense.

I can't fight whatever I'm breathing in through the mask. My eyes slowly slide shut and my entire body relaxes.

The darkness returns.

Why am I not dead?

* * *

I wake, nestled into the sheets of a bed. The whole room rocks. Slowly.

My arm has a metal brace on it, but has obviously been mostly healed and put back together. My head pounds as I try to sit up. A heaviness pervades my every movement and thought.

"Ah, ye' be awake, lass?" says a voice from across the room. "Me apologies on behalf of those bullheaded idiots. They obviously don't know t'not hit a lass that hard."

"Excuse me?" I demand. Then, I remember.

Tristan. Dead.

Father, and no doubt Mother. Dead.

I can't move the grief is so crushing. Why couldn't I have died? Why couldn't they have just shot me and left me for dead?

I want to die. I want to die so badly that it feels like my organs are ready to heave themselves out of the shell that is my body.

A wave of nausea jumbles through me and I try to hold onto the bile in my gut, even though I know I should let it out.

I turn away from the voice, slowly easing myself to no longer face him.

"The name's Silver. John Silver–– and y' should tell me your name, or else y' be called by your new nickname."

Tears roll down my face. I hate them all. They will pay for what they did. They will––

"Lass? What be your name?"

I think.

"Go to hell, pirate."

"That be an int'restin' name, lass. Never heard o' the name Gotohellpirate. It be a family name, or––"

"Tris," I murmur. "Tris Eversly."

I turn over and look at him. He's tall and broad-shouldered, with thin, triangular ears. His skin is a dark tan. With a bandana tied over his head, a hat in his lap and an earring through his left ear, he looks exactly how I expected a pirate to look.

"So, your kind does have eyes like the stories we hears."

I blink. My eyes are bright yellow with tiny slits for pupils. I realize I'm blinking with my third eyelid when I can still see him through my blinks.

I consciously blink with my outer lids.

"You be strangely silent for a woman."

"You killed my family and my friends," I reply, trying to bottle up my emotions like my father always could. "And you wonder why I'm silent."

He turns his head to the side. "Wha––? You think…" He looked away. "That weren't me crew, lass."

"You lie, pirate."

He scowls and clenches his jaw. "We may be pirates, but we're not trained for that kind o' destruction."

"Explain," I demand. "My family is dead. I have a right to know why."

"They don't tell you about the wars your planet be fightin' in?"

"What wars? We're a peaceful people."

He rests his face against his hands before looking back up at me. "Soldiers did that to your village. Not pirates. Pirates are the ones who get blamed, since we come and take the things what gets left behind. We're scavengers. Not murderers. In general, that is."

I frown. "I can't trust you."

"Don't believe me then. I figured you would've noticed that they be wearing the same uniform, but that's all right. Who would––"

I tune him out as I think and remember. I hadn't noticed it. The same pistols. The same brown and scarlet jackets. Same boots.

How could I have been so stupid?

I close my eyes and rest back into the pillows. Then, I notice the dull pain gradually increasing in my left leg, just at the hip joint.

There's a sharp jab, then it returns to being dull. It pulsates and slowly grows. I scowl and pull back the covers slightly to touch my hip.

Metal. Bright, shining bronze. Down my entire leg to the tips of my toes. My eyes widen in horror.

"What have you done to me?" I demand. I try to make my leg move, and it does. It bends at the knee slightly. It's heavy and takes effort. I turn to him, my skin quickly growing dark from fear and anger. "_What have you done?_"

Anger briefly flashes in his eyes, before it's replaced with pity. "Do you really want to know?"

I don't want to listen to him. But I know I have to. I have to know.

Why didn't he leave me for dead?

"Here. Drink this. It's supposed to help the pain." He hands a cup to me.

It looks and smells like regular water, so I down it. Almost immediately, the pain begins to fade.


	2. Brass-Leg Lass

_Silver_

We had been waiting in our ship for some time now. Watching. Just watchin' the action below. Watchin' and waitin' for the action to be over, for the soldiers to leave and the village t' be empty.

Most o' the villagers were average-Joe humans in their nightclothes, with blasters and pistols clenched in their fists. T'was obvious they would lose from the start. Unprepared. Outnumbered. It weren't their fault they weren't trained for war.

I watched as the soldiers slowly, but surely, wound their way through the town, leaving bodies behind them as they went. A flash of purple caught me eye and I pulled out me spyglass to look closer.

A humanoid man, with bright purple skin, tapered ears and fangs like a hellcat, punched and bit at the soldiers in front of him. What was a Fiolene doing on Klyptar?

I looked around. Me crew seemed to all be watching the Fiolene man as well. They murmured bets with each other on who would win in the next fight.

I'd bet on the Fiolene, hands down.

I put my eye to me spyglass again and watched. Another fell before him. His knives dripped with an assortment of blue, green and red blood.

There was another flash of purple, then a blaster shot went straight through the Fiolene's opponent. The tentacled soldier exploded and the Fiolene looked up.

His face fell and I followed his gaze to a nearby rooftop.

Another purple Fiolene–– this one a lass–– ran along the house's roofs. Her face was less angled than the man's. She looked like an odd-miss-mash of human pieces and Fiolene pieces. Those luminous yellow eyes did not belong in a human face.

A blaster shot grazed her arm, and paused before disappearing into a crack between two houses.

I was wonderin' where she had gotten off to when she appeared again on the pavement. She rolled out from under the foot o' an olive-gray behemoth, then snapped back to a standing position and fired a round off at the Fiolene's next victim.

The shot plunged into the soldier's head, but it turned to look at her, giving the Fiolene enough time to shred the soldier open with one o' his long knives.

The Fiolene rushed to the girl–– who I could only assume were 'is daughter–– and barked an order at the girl. A look of obstinacy entered her face and then it relaxed and contorted again.

Her father fell to his knees, his skin turnin' a deathly white as the purple drained out o' his veins.

She screamed and the crew was trying to hold themselves together and prevent their own laughter. I wanted to chuckle me-self at her stupidity of distractin' people in a battle, but I was too int'rested in seein' her reaction.

Next I looks, her skin is black as night, her hands dripping with blood. She screams again and we can hear it clear as day.

A few men push her into a house and pull the door shut behind them.

The rest of the battle goes quickly. Men fall left and right. Lads right 'ahind their paps.

The soldiers are destroying the last of the villagers when I see the girl again. With four shots, she downs four o' their men, then turns tail and runs. They fire their blasters at her, but somehow manage to miss.

She darts around a street corner, the soldiers at her heels. Then, a shot is fired. Purple blood stains her left pant leg.

That'd be a shattered knee.

Something inside me wants me to help her.

Something else wants to laugh in her face.

The two prevent me from movin'.

We watch as she crawls forward, towards a body–– the body of a lad. One o' the soldiers steps on her arm and I can almost hear it crack under his boot.

With her remaining arm, she drags herself to his body and grips onto it tightly.

I look away as one of 'em smashes the back o' her head with his boot.

It's not long after that when the soldiers march out o' the town and towards the next one. Yarlsby lowers the ship to the docks and we haul backside to save what we can from the fire.

Caught up in a tide o' gatherin' rations and things we can sell at the next port, I forget about the girl until I nearly trip o're her body.

I almost pass her by, leaving her for dead, when I see the faint rise of her back as she breathes.

Fiolenes are int'restin' beings. When you save their life, they be indebted to you until they save your hide.

"Lads," I call. "This one's still breathing."

Scroop's angular face peers out of a doorway. "The Fiolene?"

"The half-Fiolene."

"What would we want with her?" he asks with a shrug.

"You didn't see the way she handled her pistol, did you?"

"Sure, but we've got––"

"We got none like her in the crew."

He shakes his head and sighs. "Sssilver, she's not worth the money it'll take to patch her up. Plusss, what'll prevent her from running away once she is?"

"Don't you know anything about the Fiolene?"

Scroop shrugs. "A little."

"She can't run. We save her life, she's loyal to us until she saves our backsides."

He looks away in thought, then looks back, a small smile on his arachnid face.

"Why not, Ssssilver?"

* * *

When I finish me story, the poor lass is about to fall asleep. She stirs slightly and turns away.

"Go away," she murmurs. "Just leave me alone."

"I saved your miserable life, Miss Tris. Is that any way to thank me?"

She stiffens and then turns back to me. Through gritted teeth, she replies, "No…"

"Rest up, and you can get started on repaying that debt."

Tris turns back away from me. Her breathing quickly becomes deep and steady.

I leave the cabin. No sense stayin' when the occupant be barely conscious. Not to mention, I've got a crew to command.

We were in transit to a nearby port what be friendly with the likes of us. Our ship be nearly bursting with goods and I'm certain the men be wantin' to take a break from work. I don't blame 'em.

I'd been flying under the Jolly Roger for nearly eight years, since me pap left me his ship. Eight years under the mast changes a man. Scroop be an excellent example. He used to be quiet as a kitten.

"Well, Mr. Scroop. How far we be from port?" I ask as I join him on the navigation deck.

"A good fifty leagues, Captain," he says quickly. "Ssshould be there in the next day or ssso."

I nod. "Good."

"How'sss the Fiolene?" Scroop says. "Doesss she underssstand that––"

"That we practically own her soul?" I ask. "I don't know. Didn't much come up."

He shrugs before heading down the stairs to the main deck.

"Scroop!" I call out after him. "Her name is Tris."

He turns around, a look of slight surprise and confusion on his face. "What does it matter what she's called?"

I let him leave because I wonder the same thing. What _does_ it matter?

Somehow, I feel it's important. I don't want her to feel… unwanted. She's just lost her family. Her home.

All the same, the crew comes first and anything else comes after and she ain't one o' the crew.

The hours pass slowly. Me men scurry back and forth, some swapping the decks, some re-arranging cargo–– most of 'em just trying to find some way to occupy their free time.

There's a lot of dead time between jobs and ports. It's maddening.

After listening to Lockgrim report on the state of the rigging, sails and our utter lack of rope, which somehow always disappears on us, I go back to my cabin to grab something to read.

I push through the door and then stop.

The Fio––_Tris_ is lying on the floor, struggling to stand.

"Are you all right?" I ask, taking a step towards her.

"Yes!" she barks. "I'm fine. I don't––"

She struggles to get balanced as she rights herself. Standing on her good leg, she turns to me. "What do you want?"

"To get a book," I reply, frowning. "Tis _my_ cabin you be usin', lass."

"Oh." She looks at the floor, then looks up, those ungodly yellow eyes staring straight at me. "You were just… Oh."

I arch one eyebrow. She's making less sense than an astrophysicist drawlin' about the space-time continuum or whatnot.

Walking to the bookshelf, I grab one of the few brown volumes I keep with me. Its spine is cracked and peeling.

I turn back to head out the door.

"Wait–– Silver––"

"It be Captain to you, missy."

"Captain," she says. She bites her lower lip and I can only wonder if it hurts her because of those needle-sharp fangs.

"What?" I ask flatly.

"Never mind, then."

She pulls herself back onto the bed.

I sigh. "What do you need, lass?"

"Can you help me walk?"

I set my book on my desk. "Help you walk? You can't walk by––"

"Why do you think I was on the floor?" she replies hotly. "I don't just enjoy falling––"

"Quit taking everything so seriously. Do you know how to be respectful?"

Her tapered ears somehow shift backwards a bit and she looks down, then begins to pick her fingernails in her lap.

She mumbles something.

"What was that? I couldn't hear you?"

"I'm sorry, Captain," she murmurs, then looks back. Her eyes are dull, like lanterns slowly going out. "Just forget about it. I can try walking tomorrow when I'm a bit better."

"Don't look at me like that," I snap. "It's not my fault your family's dead."

Her jaw clenches and her lips quiver, her eyes begin to fill with tears. She inhales through her nose quickly and then draws her brows together in a scowl. She clears her throat.

"I didn't think it was."

"Good. Just so's we're clear on that little bit," I says.

It's almost like she wilts before my very eyes.

Her shoulders sag as she bends over her legs and rests her head against her knees. Her back heaves and her sobbing begins quiet until she's boo-hooing like a sea squall.

I heave a sigh and look away from her, pressing my head against my hand.

I remember when me pap died. I was 19–– out with him on the ship. Suddenly, as we were walking across the main docks, he just dropped right in front of me.

It felt like my heart was going to stop with his, seeing his frozen gaze staring up at me.

"It'll be all right, Tris," I reply. "You'll come out of this storm just fine–– and stronger than you were before."

She looks up, the whites of her eyes tinged with pink. Her third eyelid flicks over the surface, mostly clearing away the tears. Then, she turns her head and look back at the wall.

I feel more helpless than a man with his wife in labor. I'm a pirate, damn it, not some great comforting––

"It's not Tris. My name is Eversly," she says. "I lied to you."

I raise one of my eyebrows. "I don't see how that––"

"Tris was my best friend. Tristan."

"Then why did you—"

"Because you're a pirate! How do you expect me to trust a pirate? You flatter a man while you cut his purse."

"Now, hold on there," I says. "You don't know the first thing about being a pirate."

"And what's that?" she demands. "Turn your prisoners into freaking cyborgs?"

"You're an indentured servant, not a prisoner. Plus, it weren't me choice to take your leg off, lass. That be the surgeon's prerogative."

"Fine," she snaps. "Then what's the first thing I need to know about being a pirate?"

"Cheating a cheater ain't cheating."

"So, then, by extension, stealing from a thief isn't stealing?"

"Exactly." I smile at her. "Good day."

I grab my book from where I had set it and stride out the door, letting it slam behind me.

* * *

"You want to take food to her, Captain?" Jardin asks, holding a bowl of brown stew with a spoon stuck in it. "I can, if you have other things to do."

I shake my head. "It's fine. I need to get some things anyways."

Grabbing the bowl outta his hand, I head back to my cabin. She must be bored out of her mind if she can't get up and walk around.

I open the door and look in.

She's nestled between the covers, her face turned towards me. Some of her dark brown tresses hide her face.

I set the bowl down on me desk, then head to me trunk. I rummage through it, grabbing a blanket and––

"Who's–– oh," she says. I turn around in time to see her sitting up with a wide yawn.

"Sleep well, Princess?"

"Princess?"

"You're the one sleeping in the bed. As far as I'm concerned, you're the most spoiled––"

"I'll move if you want me to," she says quickly. "I want to move. I don't want to stay sitting here. It's boring."

"Then get up and move," I snap. "Don't complain about it to me."

"Aye, aye, Captain," she replies flatly.

I watch with my arms crossed as she pulls the covers back and turns so that her feet barely touch the floor. The stark contrast between the bronze of the prosthetic and the purple of her skin is strange.

She slowly puts weight on her legs as she stands. Holding her arms out to balance herself, she manages to stand solidly.

"Nice work. That wasn't so hard was it?"

Eversly frowns. "That's the easy part."

She moves her flesh-leg forward, then tries to move her brass-leg. It jerks slightly as it tries to keep up.

Then, it collapses underneath her weight and she topples towards the floor.

She braces herself with her good arm and tries to pick herself up.

"Here, lass. You can't do this on your own. You'll kill yourself."

"Why would you care? You're a pirate and you don't even know me."

"I have a vested interest in you living for at least a while longer. Now, grab me arm."

I bend over towards her and hold out my arm to her. She glances at it, then tentatively reaches out and latches hold of it.

Leaning only a bit on my arm, she rights herself and then lets go.

"You can hold on, lass. For now, at least. We can get you some kind of cane tomorrow so you can––"

"Thanks," she says, giving me a small smile that doesn't quite reach her eyes. "You're a bit of a… scurvy dog?"

I raise my eyebrows. "Oh really? Be that an insult, lass?"

"Sort of. I mean, you're kind of rude and you smell bad and––"

"How's that _kind of_ an insult then?"

"Well, you're being nice now," she says with a shrug. "You're bearable when you're being nice."

I roll me eyes. "That be a nice thought, lass. Now, let's get movin'. Do you want to walk or no?"

"All right," she says, before taking a step forward. "I think it just isn't synchronized to my body's electric signals yet."

"That's nice."

She frowns, but puts another step down on the floor, bracing herself when she almost falls.

"It hurts when I put weight on it," she says. "I think the socket isn't fully healed."

I put my head back and groan. "Why can't you just walk like––"

"I'm sorry," she says shortly. "I'd better––"

"Quit cutting me off, missy."

"Well you're cutting over my––"

"You owe me, Miss Eversly–– or whatever your name is! I saved your blasted life!"

"I didn't ask you to!"

"But I did!" I storm. "Aren't you glad you're not dead?! Aren't you glad to be alive, with a heart beating in your chest?"

"_No!_" she yells. "No, I'm not happy to be alive! There! Are you happy now?"

I pull my arm away from her. "You ungrateful little wretch."

"Why should I be glad to be alive when everyone I love is dead and I have almost no future! I'm at the mercy of a band of cutthroat, lying, stealing, scheming, looting _pirates_! And you want me to be happy?"

"Don't you think your family would?"

"Would want me to be what?! Would want me to become a pirate–– like you all?"

"No," I says, shaking my head. "Happy to be alive."

She looks away, and shifts her weight onto her flesh-leg. "That's not fair."

"It's entirely fair–– and a valid point, if I do say so me-self."

"Just leave me alone!" she yells before she pushes away from me and stumbles back to the bed.

I storm out the door and slam it behind me. Leaning against it, I take a huge breath to try and call me thoughts and temper. It'd been a long time since I'd lost me temper.

That ungrateful little urchin.

"I heard yelling," Scroop says as he taps one of his legs in front of me. "Sssounds like sshe'll be quite the handful. Not regretting the––"

"She's angry now, but she'll be fine," I says through gritted teeth.

He laughs. "You're too soft, Silver."

"I'm not soft," I reply. "And who're you to criticize your Captain?"

"I'm you're firsst mate, Sssilver. Just offering sssome friendly advice."

"Well, I didn't ask for it."

I push past him, shove my hat down over my head and stride down the hall.

Who's he to question me?


	3. Ports & Pirates

_Eversly_

I woke what I assumed to be the next morning more tired than I had the night before. The skin around my eyes still felt swollen and itched like crazy from the salt in my tears.

It's strange how one fitful night's "sleep" and crying your eyes out can make the pain as dull as a butter knife. I don't feel anything.

I feel as dead as I want to actually be.

The ceiling is made of a soft, evenly sanded wood. I stare at it in the silence that permeates every bit of my master's cabin.

Master has a weird sound to it that makes me want to crawl out of my skin.

How about the Captain's cabin?

Much better.

It's no secret about my race's condition. About us being bound to the people who save us. People take advantage of us sometimes. It doesn't normally work out for them, but they try to anyways.

I was saved because I seemed like an asset.

Not because they valued another being's life. Because I was _valuable_.

I pull the covers closer to my face.

I don't want to get out of bed. I'm so tired. It's work just to move my arms or to breathe regularly.

Time passes quickly, so it seems. The window that looks out onto the world outside is filled with light that slowly changes its angle until a bright green-yellow star shines straight into my eyes.

I turn my head away to not have to look at it.

"Rise and shine, lass!" says that loud, gruff voice as he bursts through the door.

The captain.

I don't respond, keeping my back turned away from him.

"Up and at-em, Eversly," he says. "We're going to get you to walk today."

"Why can't you just leave me alone?" I groan. "I'll walk on my own when I'm ready."

"Well, I say you're ready now. Now, get those lazy bones and gears outta that bed, or so help me, I'll drag you from it and toss you in the brig."

At the word brig, my mind becomes sharper. That's the last place I want to be right now.

"All right, all right! I'm up!" I say as I yank the covers back. I'm still wearing the bloodstained clothes that I was wearing that...

I take a deep breath to try and still the grief that floods through me. Biting my tongue to keep back tears and focus on a different pain, I suppress it to the best of my abilities.

"I got you some new clothes, outta the goodness of me heart."

"Yeah, right," I mutter under my breath.

"What's that lass? I can't hear what you said over the sound of your gratitude for having something other than blood-stained, cut-up and filthy rags to wear."

"Thanks," I say sharply.

"Thank you, what? I thought we'd been over this, lass."

I grit my teeth. "Captain."

"Excellent. Now, I'll leave you to change."

He leaves just as quickly as he came, leaving the new clothes sitting on my bed.

They're men's clothes.

I wrinkle my nose at the rough feeling of the linen, but, hey. He's right. It's better than what I have on.

Still seated on the bed, I pull my shirt over my head, being careful to not get it caught in the brace. It lands on the floor as I toss it away.

My bra is filthy, but it'll have to––

There's a long swatch of cream-color fabric in the bundle of clothes. Am I supposed to use this as...?

I pull the bra off, then wrap the fabric tightly around my chest, pinning it with a safety pin that had replaced a button on my old shirt.

It'll have to do until I can get a replacement.

I pull the baggy shirt over my head, then carefully slip out of my bottoms.

It's weird to see the metal merging with my flesh. It's been itching, and there's some scar tissue, but other than that, it's been inserted well, from what I can see.

I pull on the pants and yank on the drawstrings to make them tighter. It works, but still... not perfect.

The clothes might not be my first pick, but they're clean. Ish.

Flopping back down on the bed, I continue to stare at the ceiling until I hear a knock at the door.

"Lass? You ready?"

"No," I say quickly. "I'm still changing."

There's silence, then he says, "All right."

I smile to myself and close my eyes, ready to try to sleep again.

I sit straight up as the door bursts open and he stomps through. He scowls at me, his dark brows bunching together.

"Changing, huh?"

"What would you have done if I really was changing?" I demand.

He shrugs. "I don't know. If I had thought standing here while you did would improve the situation, I would've stayed. But that didn't sound like a good idea."

"No! It most certainly isn't!" I say, my cheeks growing hot at the casual way he said something that... indecent.

"Am I embarrassing you, lass?" he asks, a slight grin twisting his features.

"No."

"Don't lie to me. Tell me the truth."

I feel my chest tighten as I try to deny it again. I can't speak.

"Yes," flows out of my mouth and I clap my hands to it.

"So she can tell the truth," he says, his smile spreading across his face like magma across a mountain.

"Yes, I can tell the truth," I say. "What are you? An idiot?"

"I forbid you from insulting me."

I pull myself up off the bed, swaying slightly as I try to stand. "I can insult you if I want to, you loathsome excuse for––"

"So it doesn't apply to some things, but it does to others?"

What? What is he talking about?

Is he trying to figure out what he can make me do and what he can't?

"It was worth a try." He shrugs. "Now, come on, lass. Leave your bile and bitterness and let's get you on your feet."

"Fine," I murmur. I take a step forward, then manage to stumble my way to the desk without falling over.

I grip onto it as I steady myself.

"Don't scratch it up, okay?" the Captain says. "It were me father's. Don't want anythin' to happen to it."

"Do you have that cane you mentioned yesterday?" I ask. "I don't want to make you––"

"Nope. You're going to learn to walk again without one. The sooner you walk without crutches, the better off you'll be."

"But I don't––"

He looks at me, his brown eyes meeting mine. "I won't let you fall."

I shouldn't want to trust this man. He's nothing but a loutish, brutish pirate. And yet...

I want to trust him. He sounds so sincere.

Snap out of it. He's a pirate. He's probably a master of counterfeiting both coin and emotion.

And yet, the words find their way to my lips.

"All right."

He holds out his hand for me to take. I grab hold of it and take a step forward, using him as a support too much for my own comfort.

But do I really have a choice?

He guides me out the door. It's one foot after another, even thought my metal one is much more jerky and takes longer to move.

I try waiting until my foot is touching the ground for I shift my weight onto it and that seems to help a bit, but it doesn't solve its unresponsiveness.

The Captain glances at me as we reach the stairs leading to the decks above. It feels like it's been forever since I've seen outside and felt the heat of a star on my skin.

We take the stairs together, with me leaning into him heavily. He feels stronger than the copse-wood tree near my house...

It feels like my own sadness clubs me over the head, then drags me into its undertow. I try to sever its contact and push it away.

The star's light beats onto the upper deck. Other beings of almost every shape, color and size hurry about the deck doing their jobs.

This world is a cold one. I can feel the goose bumps rising on my skin as a cool breeze blows past us.

The Captain holds his arm out farther. He walks and I stumble along, following after him. My leg still feels heavier than it once did, but I can already feel a slight difference in its responsiveness.

Some of the crew stop their work to watch us. I glance at their faces with a scowl, expecting to combat hostility.

To my surprise, most of them just seem... curious.

I look away and focus on walking.

After a bit, the Captain stops.

"You're doing pretty well. Think you can handle this on your own?"

"I can try," I say before letting go of his arm and slowly proceeding forward. I work on re-balancing my weight to compensate for the heaviness and its lag.

I walk to the ship's rail and look over. There's nothing but open space below, with tiny stars twinkling lucidly in the distance.

I step a bit from the rail, then keep walking. I try to walk faster, focusing less on accuracy and more on speed.

I feel it seize underneath me and I tumble forward. Throwing my arms forward, I prepare to catch myself.

I don't hit the floor, though.

An arm around my waist pulls me back to a normal standing position, then lets go.

I don't turn around. I know it was the Captain.

I slow down and walk by myself for a bit, letting the kink work itself out. I pick up my leg and practice bending it a bit.

"You probably should focus on going slow for now, Miss Eversly," he says, taking a stand in front of me.

"Yeah. So I figured," I reply with a shrug.

"Would you like to––"

"Captain!" a blue-green being shouts. "The shipment of ropes we just received have just gone–– Oh. My apologies, Captain. Am I interrupting?"

"Only a little," the Captain replies, glancing back at me. "Lockgrim, this is Eversly, who––"

"Ah!" the man replies, his large frogeyes making an audible click as he blinks. He brings his webbed hand to his chest and makes a quick bow. "The Fiolene. Pleasure." He turns back to the Captain. "Sir, what do we do about the rope?"

"Did it just get misplaced?" I ask. "Maybe one of the crew keeps putting it in a place he figures other people will––"

"We've searched the Prisma from stem to stern. No sign of it. Or any of our other rope."

The Captain sighs. "Yes, yes. All right, Lockgrim. Just get some more and keep it somewhere safe this time. All right?"

His wide mouth widens into what I assume to be a grin and he salutes. "Aye, aye, Captain!"

He marches off and we watch him hop onto the docks.

"Ropes, huh?" I ask, turning to the Captain. "That's a strange thing to have constantly go missing. At our house, it used to be buttons. All the buttons on our shirts just... gone..."

Memories of my father bringing home yet another jar of pearly white buttons and handing them to my mother. Mother sitting with Tristan's mother while they sewed. The crisp, white shirt my mother always made Father wear to church.

When I'm aware of the world again, I realize I have tears running down my cheeks. I clear them away with a few quick blinks, then look back up at the Captain.

"I'm sorry," I say quickly. "It's... just..."

My nose is running, so I inhale quickly to try to clear it. I wipe the tears on my face away with the baggy shirtsleeve.

"Let's get you back down to the cabin, lass," the Captain says flatly. He holds out his arm and I take it.

The tears come back and I can't make them stop this time, no matter how many times I blink them away.

As we reach the bottom of the stairs, the Captain pulls his arm away, and shoves a handkerchief into my hand.

"Wipe your eyes," he says.

I quickly run the cloth over my eyes, then hold it out for him to take back.

"Keep it," he says. "The first few weeks are always the hardest. If me memory be anything to serve by, you'll be needing it again."

I nod, wipe my eyes again and then shove it into my pant's pockets.

"Come on. Hurry up now."

I take his arm again and I manage to get back to the cabin without the tears starting again.

After I open the cabin door, I turn around and look up at him. He's at least six inches taller than me–– just like my Father had been.

"Who did you lose?" I ask.

He scowls. "Why would you think I've lost somebody?"

"I don't know. Just seems like something someone with experience in grief would've said."

He looks away and says. "Me Father. Almost a decade ago. Now, go rest up. We'll be leaving to head back to Klyptar soon and I want you ready to start earning your keep."

The Captain closes the door behind him. This time, though, it's quietly. Not the slamming he generally does.

Is he faking this? I mean, maybe his father did die but a pirate grieve his father's death?

I don't know.

Maybe... maybe I misjudged him?

* * *

Escaping my grief was my goal at this point. Anything distracting that I could get my hands on would satisfy me.

Which is why I took the liberty of reading the Captain's books.

The first I had picked up was a journal filled to the brim with notes that were absolutely illegible to me. I had put it back in disappointment.

The second was more promising.

Almost as soon as I had flopped onto the bed and opened the book of sailor's tales, I had been sucked in.

It wasn't until I heard a knock at the door that I bothered to look up and notice that it was nearly dark outside.

Which would explain why it was getting harder and harder to read.

I shoved the worn volume under the pillow and sat up as the door was opening wide.

"Captain says you're to come to the galley," says a voice I don't recognize. It's low-pitched, rather than the mid-tone of the Captain's speech. "Miss?"

A head peaks around the door. A man with thick, shaggy fur that glows with bright colors enters the room.

"All right," I reply uncertainly. I haul myself off the bed and to my feet. I'm walking more so with a limp than a stumble now.

I follow behind him. He's missing a leg too, but instead of a mechanical one like mine, his is wooden and begins just below a second joint in his leg that juts out behind his knee.

We wind through the halls, then go up the stairs to the surface. I keep my hands on the wall to help support myself.

Outside, the yellow-green star is disappearing from sight and the night is growing colder. Lights blaze in the houses and taverns surrounding the docks. I can hear plenty of laughter and shouts and the general bustle of the port.

"Come on, Miss," he says, motioning for me to follow him back below decks and down another flight of stairs. I stumble down them to find a room lit by candles and the fire of an oven.

The various beings at the tables look up at me, pausing their conversation. A silence lulls over them all and I feel like crawling out of my skin with all those eyes on me. I just… I just want to blend in. Is that so hard?

"Ah! Here's the lass who's been causing so much trouble!" the Captain says, standing up. He has a tankard in one hand and a smile across his face than I can only assume to be put there through the aid of large quantities of alcohol. "Crew, this is Eversly. Eversly, the crew. Grab a plate. Come over here. Sit, sit, sit."

He tromps over to me and pushes me towards the table he was sitting at. I trip over my own feet and catch myself on the edge of the table. I peek over the top of it at the four other crewmembers.

"This be Mr. Scroop, me first mate," the Captain says, gesturing to a hulking, spiny, spider-like being with amber colored eyes that take up most of his small face. Mr. Scroop's skinny legs are spread out in a relaxed position and he makes no effort to sit down.

"And you already know Lockgrim." I nod to the frogman and me bobs his head pleasantly. His blue skin glistens with moisture in the were-light of the candles. He licks his frog-lips with his long, pink tongue.

The Captain gestures to a maroon-colored slug-man with eyestalks that project out of his shoulders. "This is Maurice."

Maurice clicks his claws in my general direction.

"And, then Hadaran."

A sand-colored pirate with tusks and large, curling horns projecting from his head nods in my general direction. He murmurs, "How'dy do?"

"Take a sseat, girl," Mr. Scroop says, his voice a whirring hiss.

I nod quickly, and scramble into a chair. The way he glares at me makes my hair stand on end.

"Do you want something to drink, lass?" the Captain asks, nudging me and slopping some his drink down the back of my brand new shirt.

"Water, please," I say, remember my father's admonishments against alcohol.

"Just water? No ale? Rum?" the Captain bursts.

"I don't drink," I murmur before turning my eyes back to the table. A long tentacle scoots under my nose and sets a bowl and crusty piece of bread on the table before me.

I look up and glance over at a large octopus-looking being. It winks one huge eye at me before returning to the pot over the stove.

"Oh, that's Yark, our cook," Hadaran says. "Don't talk too much, but seems she's happy to have another of the female gender on board."

I nod quickly, then pick up my spoon. The bowl is filled with an oily broth and short, stubby noodles that have the texture of velvety leather, but are slightly easier to chew. There're a few hunks of dark brown meat at the bottom.

Slowly sipping on the steaming concoction, I watch as the Captain and the others at the table begin the card game I had interrupted.

"Stick it or have it?" Hadaran asks Maurice.

"Have it."

Hadaran slaps a card facedown in front of him. Maurice groans.

"Broken."

"What are you playing?" I ask as Hadaran turns to Lockgrim and asks the same question.

"One-and-Thirty," Hadaran says as he tosses a card down. Lockgrim smiles and bobs his head again. Hadaran moves on to Mr. Scroop.

"Oh," I say and spoon another bite of soup into my mouth.

Tristan and I used to play card games. They were games like War, Fisherman and Rich Man, Poor Man. I remember sitting at the kitchen table with him, dealing out cards, playing and getting into squabbles that his mother or my mother would have to break up.

I look up, my eyes swimming with tears. The crewmembers aren't paying any attention to me. I grab the Captain's handkerchief out of my pocket and run it across my eyes, then blink several times.

As I look up, the Captain is staring at me, his face blank. His eyebrows raise and come together for a fraction of a second before relaxing.

I force my lips into a small smile and clench the kerchief in my clammy hands, wringing it between my fingers.


End file.
